Themes

Themes are the fundamental and often universal ideas
explored in a literary work.

Women’s Bodies as Political Instruments

Because Gilead was formed in response to the crisis caused
by dramatically decreased birthrates, the state’s entire structure,
with its religious trappings and rigid political hierarchy, is built
around a single goal: control of reproduction. The state tackles
the problem head-on by assuming complete control of women’s bodies
through their political subjugation. Women cannot vote, hold property
or jobs, read, or do anything else that might allow them to become
subversive or independent and thereby undermine their husbands or
the state.

Despite all of Gilead’s pro-women rhetoric, such subjugation creates
a society in which women are treated as subhuman. They are reduced
to their fertility, treated as nothing more than a set of ovaries
and a womb. In one of the novel’s key scenes, Offred lies in the bath
and reflects that, before Gilead, she considered her body an instrument
of her desires; now, she is just a mound of flesh surrounding a
womb that must be filled in order to make her useful. Gilead seeks
to deprive women of their individuality in order to make them docile
carriers of the next generation.

Language as a Tool of Power

Gilead creates an official vocabulary that ignores and
warps reality in order to serve the needs of the new society’s elite.
Having made it illegal for women to hold jobs, Gilead creates a
system of titles. Whereas men are defined by their military rank,
women are defined solely by their gender roles as Wives, Handmaids,
or Marthas. Stripping them of permanent individual names strips
them of their individuality, or tries to. Feminists and deformed
babies are treated as subhuman, denoted by the terms “Unwomen” and
“Unbabies.” Blacks and Jews are defined by biblical terms (“Children
of Ham” and “Sons of Jacob,” respectively) that set them apart from
the rest of society, making their persecution easier. There are
prescribed greetings for personal encounters, and to fail to offer
the correct greetings is to fall under suspicion of disloyalty.
Specially created terms define the rituals of Gilead, such as “Prayvaganzas,”
“Salvagings,” and “Particicutions.” Dystopian novels about the dangers
of totalitarian society frequently explore the connection between
a state’s repression of its subjects and its perversion of language (“Newspeak”
in George Orwell’s 1984 is
the most famous example), and The Handmaid’s Tale carries
on this tradition. Gilead maintains its control over women’s bodies
by maintaining control over names.

The Causes of Complacency

In a totalitarian state, Atwood suggests, people will
endure oppression willingly as long as they receive some slight
amount of power or freedom. Offred remembers her mother saying that
it is “truly amazing, what people can get used to, as long as there
are a few compensations.” Offred’s complacency after she begins
her relationship with Nick shows the truth of this insight. Her
situation restricts her horribly compared to the freedom her former
life allowed, but her relationship with Nick allows her to reclaim
the tiniest fragment of her former existence. The physical affection
and companionship become compensation that make the restrictions almost
bearable. Offred seems suddenly so content that she does not say
yes when Ofglen asks her to gather information about the Commander.

Women in general support Gilead’s existence by willingly
participating in it, serving as agents of the totalitarian state.
While a woman like Serena Joy has no power in the world of men,
she exercises authority within her own household and seems to delight
in her tyranny over Offred. She jealously guards what little power
she has and wields it eagerly. In a similar way, the women known
as Aunts, especially Aunt Lydia, act as willing agents of the Gileadean
state. They indoctrinate other women into the ruling ideology, keep
a close eye out for rebellion, and generally serve the same function
for Gilead that the Jewish police did under Nazi rule.

Atwood’s message is bleak. At the same time as she condemns Offred,
Serena Joy, the Aunts, and even Moira for their complacency, she
suggests that even if those women mustered strength and stopped
complying, they would likely fail to make a difference. In Gilead
the tiny rebellions of resistances do not necessarily matter. In the
end, Offred escapes because of luck rather than resistance.